We have long discussed how educators are instilling viewpoint intolerance in students from the earliest grades. The latest example is the cancellation of a visit to McKinley Elementary School in Fairfield, Connecticut, by Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. The students had the opportunity to speak and interact with a cabinet member, but the school cancelled the event due to political opposition from parents.
Reports indicated that the visit, part of McMahon’s “History Rocks” tour in celebration of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, was cancelled due to a campaign by parents.
The parents rose up after McKinley Principal Christine Booth wrote them saying that the school was
“proud to offer this unique opportunity and… unforgettable experience for our McKinley students. Students will enjoy a dynamic, interactive assembly that brings American history and civic learning to life through fun, game show style activities, hands-on participation, and even prizes. This high energy experience is designed to spark curiosity, celebrate our country’s story, and make learning memorable for our students.”
Fairfield Superintendent of Schools Michael Testani folded immediately under the political pressure rather than stand firm that the school is a place for different ideas and voices:
“Following this evening’s announcement about the Secretary of Education’s planned visit to McKinley on Friday, we heard from many families who expressed concerns and shared that they were considering keeping their children home. Due to these circumstances, the Secretary of Education’s visit to Fairfield has been canceled.”
Those “circumstances” were the combination of political pressure from parents and a lack of principle by school officials.
These parents and officials have taught these students a terrible lesson: they should not be exposed to opposing views or speakers. They are raising a generation of speech-phobics that reflects their own intolerance and bias.
OK kids, listen up! Just take our word for it, you don’t want to even listen to one of these Trumpish types,
We are going to keep your mind clear of these confounding and confusing topics, God knows what might happen if you even listened to one word!
It’s evil magic they deploy to control your mind and make you a puppet! They will have you killing puppies and kitties! Their voodoo will be so strong you cannot resist! You don’t want the puppies to die DO YOU?!?
You should be so grateful to your elders and betters that we take these worries away from you!
Now lets have a quiet session, everyone put your heads on your desk for awhile while honored teacher buys a pair of shoes online.
CT school are not a place of learning about ideas that could free you from the lefts ideology.
Everyone knows once someone hears even one conservative idea, they turn super-MAGA and they will go all ‘individual rights’ on the commies in education. It’s their biggest fear: facts. So they control the narrative and enforce with violence.
“considering keeping their children home.” is not a reason to cancel it for everyone, unless that’s what you really want.
It was Testani that cancelled it, NOT the parents! ‘Parents’ is his excuse. Get him out!
Was it all the parents? Or a percentage of the parents? They couldn’t be the adults in the room and have an open discussion? Not just cancelling the Ed. Sec’y, but it shows the kids that if they don’t like another student in the room, there is no chance for any sharing, friendship, cooperating, just plain getting listening and getting along. Another person’s opinion is not mine, so I won’t listen.
I went with my daughter for several years to an annual program at her alma mater. The speakers were generally liberal, but I listened.
When Sen. Warren was first running, a “rumor” said she was going to be in town. That same daughter (who runs more left of center) and I went to “listen”. Turned out it was just a rumor. I doubt she would have come to our little state university town. But I was willing to “listen” and maybe learn something.
I really appreciate this perspective. That’s exactly the lesson being missed. It was never about whether everyone agreed with the speaker, but whether adults were willing to model how to listen, disagree, and still coexist.
What you describe with your daughter is real civic formation. You showed that listening is not endorsement, and disagreement does not require avoidance. That is how people learn to live together in a free society.
Canceling instead of engaging teaches the opposite lesson, that discomfort ends dialogue and difference ends cooperation. That lesson carries far beyond one speaker or one day, and kids absorb it whether we intend them to or not.
Liberals and Democrats can’t compete in the area of ideas, policies and lawful actions so they have to silence the opposition.
Here’s a novel idea. The Administration should consider abandoning any effort to assist or enlist Dems, Blue states and Blue cities in any outreach program like this. How about concentrating on those of us, like myself in Alabama, who have supported them through thick and thin? I’d extend that to redirecting federal funds to states that voted for Mr. Trump. Whether he courts them or not the Blue areas will never change.
Now implement it.
So have Trump invite the kids and their parents to the White House. If they refuse to go they can explain it to their children when they’re older.
S T O O P I D
Parents should *not* have a direct say in who does or does not speak at their schools.
Should they have an indirect say?
No veto power, agreed. No voice at all, absolutely not. Parents can opt their own children out without silencing everyone else. Confusing participation with censorship is the real problem here.
Heads Up – Don’t let your Wife read this one!
Scoop: Epstein files include “hung like a horse” message to Clinton email
Jeffrey Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell once sent a message to an email address associated with former President Clinton that complimented the size of the recipient’s genitals, according to a Trump administration official familiar with the email released in the latest batch of Epstein files.
By: Alex Isenstadt, Marc Caputo Axios ~ January 30th 2026
https://www.axios.com/2026/01/30/epstein-files-ghislaine-maxwell-clinton
The reviews are in for Melania’s movie:
“The First Lady is a preening, scowling void of pure nothingness in this ghastly bit of propaganda.”
https://www.the-independent.com/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/melania-trump-movie-review-documentary-b2911108.html
^ so much hate and envy of a beautiful woman by a left-wing ugly feminist ^
Melania is as pretty as the surgeon’s knife could make her.
If the MSM hates it, and hates her, that settles it – I’m going to see it over and over at the box office.
DIG IT
Spoiler alert.
Here we go again.
Awww. Either you believe a lying left wing publication who would go out of business before complimenting anything to do with Trump, which means that you are incapable of independent thought or you have terminal Trump Derangement Syndrome, which means you are incapable of independent thought.
Which is it?
As an aside, I see you are a coward, hiding behind the anonymous moniker. I actually use my real name.
Trump Derangement Syndrome is also afflicting those with Hitler Derangement Syndrome. Similar causation.
Probably authored by a bleeding heart lib working for Vogue, etc.
Dear Prof Turley,
Trump deserves all the credit here. He promised to return education back to the states and local control. Education Secretary Linda McMahon wrote about this kind of agreement recently: “We’ll peel back the layers of federal bureaucracy by partnering with agencies that are better suited to manage programs and empowering states and local leaders to oversee the rest. These partnerships are commonplace across the federal government to improve service delivery and increase efficiency.”
Update. Rep. Ilhan Omar will be ok after being sprayed with a noxious concoction of MAGA skunk juice during a recent Town Hall. .. I know that will be a load off for many free-speechers here.
*ICE is doing a targeted law enforcement investigation.. . of Omar.
She is the ultimate lying fraud huckster. Untouchable.
The new Epstein files released today are more blacked-out than Whiskey Pete Hegseth at the Pentagon Christmas party
They don’t have time to arrest the 10 billionaires implicated in the Epstein files, but at least Don Lemon is off the streets
Priorities, am I right?
Everyone is much safer with Don Lemon off the streets.
Maybe not everyone, but the people who attend worship services at the church he and his fellow thugs disrupted will be safer.
Worship led by a person who does all those things Christ said no to do. Even the Church of Satan is more Christian than the leaders of that church.
He’s not off the streets. He was released without bail.
They covered our asses for us so to speak.
Don Lemon is the low self-esteem kid everyone egged on to do the stupidest stunts, knowing they will get in trouble or hurt, taking advantage of their extreme desire for social acceptance. Now that Lemonhead is back on the streets, he has set a high bar for himself that he must keep raising to stay newsworthy enough to stay within the bounds of the news cycle. C’mon Donny, there must be some constitutional right someone has somewhere that you need to violate?
Billy Blythe is not a billionaire. Yet. At the rate he’s been making money from speaking engagements in Russia, it won’t be long.
He’s the most corrupt, disgusting, vile, deceptive con artist in the U.S. Just wait. The Eppi Files are going begin the revelation of who he really is and he will land in prison for life. Most folks have NO idea of the depth of his depravity. You will be shocked.
I am no fan of Lemon.
It is an abuse of government power to go after journalists that Trump does not like.
Lemon should sue.
Lemon on Lemon = Yellow Journalism 🍋
Nobody is above the law. They got an indictment against Lemon for alleged crimes. He will have his day in court.
A prosecutor can get an indictment against a ham sandwich.
The plan is simple – present incomplete information to the grand jury and no exculpatory evidence.
Normally a prosecutor won’t do this because it would mean getting their teeth kicked in when it goes to the courtroom, but the prosecutor in this case doesn’t plan on ever going to court and is already toothless, so it doesn’t matter to them. Their career ends in under 3 years no matter what they do.
The prosecutor here is just the rubber glove on Trump’s fecal fist.
If Trump went after those he didn’t like or those who’ve done him dirty, our prisons couldn’t hold them all. I do think fining him one half billion dollars for nothing was right on. And that lying piece of garbage, Big Fanny Willis, would be wearing stripes by now.
I do not think it is wrong to see this blog as a reflection of our broader culture. We have conservatives and liberals, far left and far right, arguing endlessly about the issues of the day, often with intelligence and passion. Yet almost none of those problems ever resolve.
The trap is thinking we are debating solutions, when in fact we are debating downstream symptoms. Very smart people can still be formed to confront problems only in ways that carefully avoid the root cause. When that happens, discussion becomes perpetual motion rather than progress.
The deeper issue is citizen formation. Our constitutional republic was a grand experiment with one indispensable ingredient: citizens capable of self-government. Remove that ingredient, and every other argument becomes noise.
When the capacity for self-government erodes, problems multiply, culture fragments, and institutions strain under demands they were never designed to carry. Until that reality is confronted honestly, we will keep circling the same disputes while the underlying condition worsens.
The outcome of that trajectory is not mysterious. It is predictable. And history is not kind to societies that refuse to address their root causes.
“We have conservatives and liberals, far left and far right, arguing endlessly about the issues of the day, often with intelligence and passion. Yet almost none of those problems ever resolve.” -Olly
Dear Olly, this situation is exactly what the Higher Powers want it to be. Left fighting Right, Right fighting Left … so that they use up all their energy between them and don’t look Up.
That’s to say: So Left & Right don’t fight together against the Higher Power(s) that be.
God know what would happen if the Left & Right together fought the Higher Powers (The Powers (Overlord) controlling all 3 Branches of the Government).
“When the capacity for self-government erodes, … The outcome of that trajectory is not mysterious. It is predictable. And history is not kind to societies that refuse to address their root causes.” -Olly
WhenThe capacity for self-government has eroded.Yes, that is exactly the distinction I am trying to draw. A people properly formed for self-government would not be in this predicament to begin with. The fact that we are here tells us something upstream already failed.
When that inward capacity erodes, the instinct is not reflection but displacement. We go looking for a boogeyman to blame. And to be clear, there are real actors who exploit weakness and seize opportunity. History is full of them. But exploitation only succeeds where internal collapse has already occurred.
You do not need hidden higher powers orchestrating division for this outcome to emerge. A population no longer capable of judgment, restraint, and shared responsibility will fragment on its own. Left and Right exhaust themselves fighting over symptoms while power naturally consolidates into institutions that promise order, security, or relief.
Even if those exploiting the situation put their intentions in writing, a people unformed for self-government will still see themselves only as victims, never as participants in their own decline. Responsibility is projected outward, and the cycle repeats.
None of this is novel. It is predictable. History is not kind to societies that refuse to confront their root causes. Human nature does not change, and no culture, however advanced it believes itself to be, is immune once it abandons the formation necessary to govern itself.
. Succinctly, government is too big?
Sorry, but I don’t have a succinct answer.
Here’s the thought experiment. If human beings had no sinful nature, there would be no need for government at all. Rights would not need securing because no one would violate them.
Government exists precisely because people do have a sinful nature. That means the root problem is always the people, not the structure built to manage them.
From there, the only rational question is how much government is necessary to secure rights given how well people govern themselves. Individually. In families. In communities. In states. The better people self-govern upstream, the less government is required downstream.
When self-government fails at every lower level, power inevitably consolidates upward. That is how you end up with massive government trying to manage millions of people who no longer manage themselves.
So no, there is no magic number for the size of government. Size is an effect. Formation is the cause.
Government ideally exists regardless of sin because it is necessary to have some organization that deals with problems that individuals cannot manage. No one is going to just decide one day to add 6 lanes of highway across their property on the off chance that neighbors on neighbors stretching hundreds of miles will all come together and mix concrete and lay rebar and crushed compacted rock to build one.
There won’t be any way for a million people in a city to collectively decide the best place for a fire house or a hospital.
Sure. Everyone ideally would have a 40 hour a week job doing the things that government does in addition to the 40-70 hour a week job they already have.
Olly, I wish for you to live in a place that operates exactly the way you desire. It is mean spirited of me to make that wish as the level of suffering you would experience would be incredible. But you would get exactly what you want.
The host of this site and his fans are most certainly not politically conservative by any stretch of the imagination. They are all reactionary populists.
That label does more to obscure than explain. “Reactionary populist” is often just a shorthand used when people reject elite consensus but do not fit neatly into partisan categories.
What I see here is not ideological uniformity, but skepticism toward institutions that demand deference while avoiding accountability. That skepticism cuts across traditional Left and Right precisely because it is about power, not party.
Reducing that to a pejorative label avoids engaging the arguments being made and proves the broader point. When categories replace reasoning, discussion stalls and understanding goes nowhere.
Commerce 🤔.
. Give a concrete example of civic formation and carry it through with a concrete example with a well reasoned solution. I don’t understand the vagueries. It can be very simple using a chosen principle. Concrete principle, please, Olly.
The Sean,
The host isn’t a reactionary populist. He’s a paid agitator. The fans are mainly Trump sycophants who are getting lined up to be minions.
See my book “The Right to Rage: How Billionaires Pay Millionaires to Convince the Middle and Lower Class to be Minions.”
The Heart of Man.
. Olly, are you a consequentialist as a working philosophy? Are you a majority minority believer? What do you think of Pareto’s Principle as a goalpost in government policy? Should the federal government address policy when that affects all citizens only?
What’s your philosophy so we can sift out root causes.
Thank you
I used to think I was a complicated guy with sophisticated theories. After nearly two decades of working through this, I’ve come to the opposite conclusion. The truth is not complicated at all.
I’m no longer interested in debating an endless list of downstream problems. I’ve done that. You fix one, another replaces it, and every time the proposed solution is more government, more programs, more bureaucracy. That cycle has delivered massive debt, an unaccountable administrative state, and a population that is increasingly ignorant, apathetic, and dependent.
The root problem is not policy. It is people. This was designed to be a self-governing nation under a Constitution grounded in the principles of the Declaration of Independence. That system only works if citizens have the capacity for self-government, first as individuals, then in families, communities, states, and finally at the federal level to keep power in check.
I spent a year testing this with a group, chasing every proposed root cause we could think of. Every time, we came back to the same three failures. Voter ignorance. Voter apathy. Voter dependence. Fix those, and many other problems begin to resolve themselves. Ignore them, and nothing else holds.
I’m not complicated. Either we restore citizen formation or we keep wasting time fixing symptoms while the underlying condition gets worse.
Great job Olly. Now get to the root causes for voter apathy, voter ignorance, and voter dependence. You haven’t gone even 10% down that rabbit hole. All of those aren’t causes; they are symptoms.
One cause is the Union Army didn’t kill every single slave owner. Instead, the Union paid them for the trouble of losing their “property,” an admission that the Union recognized the right to own slaves.
We HAVE a costitutional republic and it works just fine. There is no problem and everything is working as intended.
The only problem, if there is one, is that the left continues to fight the american way of life. They couch it in social terms of supposed suppressed social freedoms to gain support and never address their true target: Your wallet. economic freedom? That’s called capitalism and they can’t have that. Ethics and morality? anything goes, as long as they have your money. And you should give it to them because they are ‘good’ and so good that they can point out the bad people for you to target. Like the people with money, money makes them bad so they get their money and we’ll use it for ‘good’, promise! Money’s bad anyway cause it makes you a bad rich person, better get it out of everyone’s hands!
The list of free ‘gifts’ is long and presented as ‘rights’. FDR: freedom from ‘want’. Trans ‘rights’. Illegal immigrant ‘rights’. DEI ‘rights’. reperations ‘rights’. ANY right you could want like it’s Invent-a-right. BUT the money, they want the money and will even sell you the god-given rights you already possess, for MONEY.
I agree that many on the left actively oppose core features of the American way of life, especially economic freedom, property rights, and limits on power. That critique is valid.
Where I disagree is the claim that the constitutional republic is working just fine. If it were, those movements would not be so effective or so durable. A healthy republic does not require constant expansion of invented rights, redistribution schemes, or moral justifications for taking other people’s property.
The deeper problem is not just ideology. It is that a large portion of the citizenry no longer understands natural rights, limited government, or their own responsibility in a system of self-government. When citizens are ignorant, apathetic, or dependent, they become easy targets for promises of free goods rebranded as rights.
So yes, there are people selling power and money under the language of compassion. But they succeed only because the ground has already been prepared. If citizens were formed to recognize the difference between rights and entitlements, that sales pitch would fail.
The Constitution still exists on paper. Whether it functions in practice depends on the people living under it. That is the unresolved issue.
Olly,
In this universe no one has any natural right to anything.
Climb into a tiger enclosure at the zoo and see what rights nature has given you.
I understand from your philosophy that those who have low IQ and those with crippling diseases or damage aren’t worth extending rights to. In fact, generally lacking the upper body strength men have, women have no rights at all, regardless of intelligence. They aren’t entitled to equal representation because they aren’t physically able to prevent them from being taken from them.
Our constitutional republic was a grand experiment with several indispensable ingredients: slave holders and half the population forbidden from voting by reason of sex and another half forbidden from voting by reason of not being landholders. In other words, a grand experiment in the wealthy governing the country to their own benefit.
Age after age has seen the wealthy manipulate the common folk by using the government as a stalking horse.
The goal was never actual self-government. The goal was the illusion of self-government to hide that the common folk have no control at all.
The indictment was immediately met with mockery by various attorneys, journalists and legal commentators. New York Times Justice Department correspondent Glenn Thrush observed that one of the allegations against Lemon “is that he and [a] protester — 2 people — ‘largely surrounded’ the pastor, and then Lemon asked the pastor ‘questions.'” Washington D.C. based attorney John Aravosis wrote on social media that the indictment “basically accuses [Lemon] of journalism.”
Well, guilty as charged. He probably ask a question that might have made trump look bad. Insurrection at the least. Perhaps a public hanging?
A religious SERVICE was in progress, you clown. IT’s not like he asked to speak to the pastor and was granted an interview. He imposed himself, along with the crowd of protesters, upon the church attendees IN THE MIDDLE OF SERVICES.
When did that become a federal offense?
When Congress passed the Conspiracy Against Rights statute, 18 U.S.C. 241, and the statute making it an offense to interfere with the exercise of religious freedom at a place of worship, 18 U.S.C. 248.
You can read the indictment. It’s not difficult to find on the internet with a simple google search. Here’s one link:
https://d3i6fh83elv35t.cloudfront.net/static/2026/01/CASE-026-cr-00025-LMP-DLM.pdf
Good , helpful omfk
Great link, omfk, thanks.
Maybe trespass. What is a church function? I’m not opposed to a journalist infiltrating temples especially if there’s drug running in the backroom. Investigation by press…
What was the purpose of the invasion?
When they passed the KKK law. Is that OK with you?
We’re trying to protect peoples rights here. Is that OK with you?
Bingo
And refused to leave when asked.
Oh, no, a service was in progress. I assume this means that if an immigrant starts to pray, that ICE will instantly stand back and take their hands off? Or is respect for religion only for some?
Why is there a need for a religious service? Can God not hear prayers otherwise?
He and his thugs violently disrupted a church service.
Right. And and when those “Patriots” tried to overthrow the government on the “Day of Love,” that was cool.
What??
Seattle?
Sean, are you for both or against both?
1. He and his thugs violently disrupted a church service.
2. “Patriots” tried to overthrow the government.
Pick now. ur rep on the line here…
It’s wrapped in the same federal law used to protect baby killing centers.
Lemon disrupted. The interview could have been conducted after the service while others invaded and disrupted. He could have used video quietly from a pew as a journalist, reporter.
Following this evening’s announcement about the Secretary of Education’s planned visit to McKinley on Friday, we heard from many families who expressed concerns and shared that they were considering keeping their children home. Due to these circumstances, the Secretary of Education’s visit to Fairfield has been canceled.
That has to be about the most craven, foolish, moronic statement from a schools superintendent anyone could come up with. Oh no, the person might say something I disagree with! Oh no, I would never want to hear that, because I’m a snowflake. And I would never want school kids to ever hear diverse views and arguments on any topic: only the extreme left-wing dogma allowed in this school district.
Pathetic. Principal Booth: good for you for doing what was right. Mr. Testani, shame on you. You’ve failed your students in the most basic way possible. You don’t deserve to be anywhere near a school or school district ever again in your life.
Lefties = Snowflakes.
I’ve long saidThe Democrat party is primarily comprised of angry white liberal women and weak men.
This seems to confirm that observation and assessment.
Yup. It’s the angry white liberal women and weak men who promote shunning family members at Thanksgiving dinner, and dropping longtime friendships over someone else being a Trump voter. They are mentally and emotionally sick, diseased, and pathetic.
But you’re no conservative. You don’t think character counts which is why you support Trump.
Cry harder Gigi, we can’t hear you.
Or Bill Clinton? hmmm Ano
You are gatekeeping what a conservative is? Are you a conservative? I would love to hear about who you think has enough character to execute our laws. I’ll say Trump is the best at it of all the presidents in my lifetime. He has repeatedly made statements that show the depth of his character and courage, for example; “I just want people to stop dying”. My vote for Trump was solely on his character. Never thought it was possible to do what he already has accomplished. Liberal screeches are way in the background as America looks to the future. US President is the most dangerous job in the world and Trump is the most courageous of them because today the dangers are the largest they’ve ever been. I feel sorry for anyone that cannot see his character, the failure is in you, not reality. There is no better man alive today that can bring the world to freedom and prosperity. Overlook flaws, all humans have them, and see the greatness. or don’t, and be a worm.
Shoe on the other foot test– drag queen story hour?
It seems Superintendent of Schools Michael Testani lacks the testicoli required to stand up to bullies.
“The cancellation of a visit to McKinley Elementary School in Fairfield, Connecticut, by Secretary of Education Linda McMahon.”
– Professor Turley
_____________________
In the Constitution there is no mandate to provide education.
In Article 1, Section 8, there is no power to tax for education, and there is no enumerated power to regulate education.
The Department of Education is unconstitutional and pure whimsy.
The Department of Education Organization Act, 1979, is unconstitutional and must have been struck down by the Supreme Court.
What must be cancelled here is the Department of Education.
The singular American failure is the judicial branch, with emphasis on the Supreme Court.